Population Matters

Fundamental changes are currently taking place in the composition and distribution of the British population. These include the increasing numbers of very elderly, massive fluctuations in age structure arising from the baby boom and bust of the 1960s and 1970s, the rising proportion of non-family households, the growth of ethnic minority populations and the continuing exodus of people from the larger cities and declining industrial areas. These changes are having major impacts on the size and characteristics of the populations of individual localities, and have implications for business and governments.
The purpose of this book is to examine the scale and significance of the local dimensions of these developments and the implications for central government, complementing the existing literature which focuses almost entirely on the overall national picture. It contains a set of ten original studies which demonstrate the existence of marked geographical variations in population profiles and trends and highlight the main implications and responses. The focus is primarily on those policy areas where there needs to be a local-scale mechanism for decision-making and implementation, such as education, labour recruitment, house-building needs, social services and health care.
The book is intended mainly for second and third year students reading demography, geography, planning, or social studies, but sufficient background on demographic developments and policy context is given to interest a wider readership of professionals and laypersons. Publication is timed to coincide with the release of the local and small area statistics from the 1991 Population Census, and individual chapters give guidance on follow-up work which can use the new data to update and extend the research on the various topics presented here.